


After the darkness I’m born again

by zimriya



Series: kindling [5]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Beta Moon Taeil, Canon Compliant, Dubious Consent, Knotting Dildos, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Minor Jung Yoonoh | Jaehyun/Lee Taeyong, Multiple Orgasms, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Omega Lee Donghyuck | Haechan, Sex Toys, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:15:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25787944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zimriya/pseuds/zimriya
Summary: It starts somewhere over the North Pacific Ocean flying to Atlanta but doesn’t get bad until after the rodeo.
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Moon Taeil
Series: kindling [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1573561
Comments: 19
Kudos: 126





	After the darkness I’m born again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hexmen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hexmen/gifts).



> HAPPY BIRTHDAY, FRIEND!!!!!!!!!!! MAY YOU HAVE THE BEST DAY EVER!!!!!!! I'm glad I was able to finish this for you _finally_. ~~Can you believe we originally discussed this thing in April???????????~~ (Thank you for betaing your present, also.)
> 
> Technically speaking this takes place in the same universe as [the desire trilogy](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1607902), however, since I wrote it and conceived of it after I had written [And I hope you like it where I’m now](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22978630), it’s not necessarily canon. I mean. It probably happened, but. Who knows. Also there was no pandemic in the Baby!verse!!!!!!
> 
> This fic is tagged “Dubious Consent” because there is an element of “they would not be doing this if it weren’t necessary,” but despite that, everyone is consenting as well as they can within that frame of reference. 
> 
> Title from “Kick It” by NCT 127.

It starts somewhere over the North Pacific Ocean flying to Atlanta but doesn’t get bad until after the rodeo. It starts with just a flush, and Donghyuck thinks maybe it’s just a fever, or the humidity. Maybe it’s the excitement of the stage—of performing at a _rodeo_ —or something. Donghyuck has no reason to believe otherwise, certainly. And he’s too busy being excited about the experience to pay it any mind; worry is for after it’s more than just a fever and a flush, for when it’s likely to wreck his voice, and he has to sit out two concerts in Fukuoka back-to-back.

This is NCT 127’s first rodeo and the rodeo’s first Kpop group and it’s the first time they’re getting to perform “Kick It” for their international fans. That’s the most important thing—the fans; the performance. The pink in his cheeks, the comments the fans leave on his after-show V LIVE—all of that is irrelevant in comparison. Not important. Donghyuck doesn’t even think about the fact that it’s early March and on its way to an early spring—he’s too busy receiving fancy belt buckles and giving interviews, being a member of the first Kpop act to perform for the Houston Rodeo. Too busy being NCT’s Haechan, not Lee Donghyuck, the omega.

He doesn’t even think about it.

It’s not important, because he’s not debilitatingly ill.

On the layover in Atlanta, they get followed around the terminal and there are photos of Donghyuck, tucked in close to Taeil-hyung and smiling at him from behind his mask, but it’s fine—he’s fine, and it’s not important.

Until he isn’t. Until it is.

Until Donghyuck finds himself shaken awake from what can’t have been more than an hour’s nap, not even changed all the way out of his plane clothes; he’s still wearing his jeans. His clothes are soaked, the sheets aren’t much better off, and Johnny-hyung is standing over him with a hand on his shoulder, clearly having shaken him awake.

“Hyung?” Donghyuck tries to say, only it comes out a wrecked, rasping thing, and for the two seconds where he’s not fully awake enough to take stock of the rest of his body, he worries that he is actually coming down with something—a real fever, on top of an already grueling schedule.

“Haechan-ah,” Johnny-hyung says, and his voice is wrecked too. “You—I thought you said you took your pills?”

For two more seconds all Donghyuck can do is stare, breathing hard, trying to make it all make sense, but then the rest of the room filters in like light through a slide. The frown on Johnny-hyung’s face is more than just polite, faked concern; it’s a look that Donghyuck has only seen once before, barely seventeen and not even debuted and fighting to still be put in the new group of NCT teenagers because living with all of the 127 hyungs forced his body to mature fucking early. His clothes are soaked, and the sheets are soaked, and Donghyuck can still feel the flush covering his nose and cheeks but it’s not sickness after all.

It’s heat.

Donghyuck is in _heat_.

His first heat, in four years. His _only_ heat, in four years. He’s been good—not made any jokes that were totally about his designation because he has to be a hyung in Dream, and in 127 he has Taeyong’s disapproval to contend with. Donghyuck has only ever had one heat, at the start, when you’re not supposed to suppress, and it nearly destroyed his career before it could even begin. Now he’s in heat again, and NCT 127 is scheduled to go on _Music Bank_ tomorrow.

“No,” is all he manages. And, “Johnny-hyung. No,” again like a broken record. _No_. No no no no _no_. He feels sick, his stomach keeps trying to turn itself in knots, and underneath it all, like some sort of parasitic, infectious worm, is the knowledge that Taeyong-hyung is for once in the dorm without Jaehyun-hyung, and that Doyoung-hyung is in the kitchen, probably making lunch.

Both of them smell good on bad days and drive him crazy on good days but today it’s ten-fold, good and crazy and nothing that Donghyuck wants, because he doesn’t want alphas. He’s too busy for dating and too bossy for alphas and an _idol_ , not allowed to date.

“No,” Donghyuck says again, because it’s all he can say. “No—Hyung—No—I’m fine—”

“I’m calling Manager-hyung,” is all Johnny-hyung says, in a tone that brooks no argument and makes Donghyuck’s stupid, dumb omega hindbrain whine. His toes curl. His vision goes spotty. It’s—it’s two hours too late for ovulation inducers; he shouldn’t have taken the nap; he shouldn’t have ignored the signs; he should have put up more a fuss when Jungwoo-hyung was pleading for Jaehyun-hyung and Taeyong-hyung to keep their get togethers on the fifth floor.

He should have fucking realized, on the plane, over the Pacific Ocean, in Atlanta, in Houston, coming off stage. He should have been fucking prepared. He shouldn’t have been fucking stupid. He should get in the fucking shower.

“Youngho-hyung,” Donghyuck says, in a voice that is unrecognizable even to himself. “I—I’m sorry—”

Johnny-hyung pulls Donghyuck into a hug so quickly that his head spins all over again, but this time the skin to skin contact is a relief, even though the animal part of him is raging that it isn’t right, that Johnny-hyung isn’t right, that he may be a hyung but he’s not an alpha—just a beta—not the _right_ beta—and Donghyuck _tamps that thought down_.

“It’ll be okay, Donghyuck-ah,” Johnny-hyung tells Donghyuck’s hair. “It’ll be okay. I’ll call Manager-hyung. You’ll be okay.”

But Donghyuck isn’t listening. Donghyuck knows better. Donghyuck isn’t nearly scent blind, like Johnny-hyung. Under the burning of his skin—the tickle in his nose because Taeyong-hyung has left his room to find Doyoung-hyung in the kitchen, whispering, “Do you smell that? Is he—” before Doyoung-hyung can hush him—under the stink of it all, the _heat_ of it all, is the knowledge that Donghyuck is already too far gone for pills.

And NCT 127 is scheduled to go on _Music Bank_ tomorrow.

“Fuck,” Donghyuck mutters, overtop Johnny-hyung’s worthless platitudes. “Fuck.”

* * *

Everyone in the band convenes on the fifth floor alongside Byoungjun-hyung and a harrowed looking SM doctor, who isn’t even the poor sap Donghyuck has been saddled with for annual visits and is instead supposedly an expert in all things male omega. _He_ keeps glancing between the members in the room and Donghyuck himself, who’s on their sofa, forcibly covered in more blankets than would have been necessary even if he was suffering from hypothermia, not just simple biology. Every time Donghyuck tries to peel a layer off, Mark makes a terrible face and Taeyong-hyung hurries over to put it right back on, while Jaehyun-hyung bores holes in Donghyuck like he’s going to lose control right that second and jump Taeyong-hyung the moment he gets in range. Conversely, Yuta-hyung is staring down the doctor alongside Doyoung-hyung, who seems perpetually caught between mild nervous laughter and outright hysterics.

Johnny-hyung, Taeil-hyung, and Jungwoo-hyung are in the room too, but Donghyuck’s hindbrain isn’t fixated on them, doesn’t track where they are at any given moment, or note the amount of cologne they’re wearing, or who showered the most recently. (It’s Jaehyun-hyung, but the sweetness of his shampoo does nothing to mask the thickness of Taeyong-hyung’s possession, and the combination of that warring with nearly two years of cohabitation-familiarity is making Donghyuck’s brain ache, it’s so confusing.)

It doesn’t help that as the conversation continues—Byoungjun-hyung interrogating; Taeyong-hyung leading; the poor SM doctor nervously answering—it becomes rapidly clear that the end solution to the problem is a knot, and one in the room. Donghyuck isn’t an idiot and he read up more on omega biology than the rest of his band combined the moment he presented. Furthermore he _knows_ himself, and he’s not simply waiting this out. Not even twenty-four hours would be enough time, and they don’t have that.

“He cannot—he cannot perform—” the SM doctor is saying, looking like he’d rather be anywhere but here, and Byoungjun-hyung levels him a particularly probing stare.

“But why not—”

“It would be—it would be cruel—”

“I can’t stand,” Donghyuck puts in helpfully, the first thing he’s said since being deposited on the couch by Johnny-hyung, who was the only person willing to carry him. Taeyong-hyung offered, Jaehyun-hyung looked about two seconds from an aneurysm, and Mark’s nerves made him start laughing so hard he had to be taken out of the room. “I mean, I probably could if I really had to.” _If one of you made me_ , he leaves unsaid, but none of them are stupid enough to point that out. “But dancing would probably be impossible at this point—”

“Well then what can we do? And be straightforward. Stop talking around it.” Byoungjun-hyung crosses his arms and levels the SM doctor with a hard stare.

“Hyung,” Donghyuck tries to say.

“Well—we—” The SM doctor is looking imploringly at Donghyuck now. “Are you sure you don’t want to do this in private?”

“They’re my family,” Donghyuck says, wrapping the blankets more securely around his shoulders. “And given one of them is going to have to put their dick in my ass—”

There is a chorus of disapproval from all both staff members and also Taeyong-hyung, but Doyoung-hyung is already doing the math, his mouth rounding into a small ‘o.’

“Oh,” he says outloud, when no one else says anything in light of Donghyuck’s bombshell. “Oh—Haechan-ah, if you had to choose, which one of us?” He doesn’t really finish that sentence but already he’s angling towards Mark, who makes the most sense, really. He’s the youngest after Donghyuck, he’s an alpha, he’s single—but Donghyuck has lived in close quarters with most of the alphas in the band, and he… He can’t admit who it is. Who it would be, if it had to be an alpha. He can’t do that to Taeyong-hyung. Not this soon. Not when they’re still… honeymooning. Starry eyed. Standing next to each other only refraining from holding hands because the doctor is a stranger.

“None of you,” Donghyuck says. “Gross.”

Doyoung-hyung looks momentarily relieved, and then worried. “But then—”

“Thank you for your time,” Byoungjun-hyung says, already ushering the SM doctor towards the door, even as he begins protesting.

“You’re not just going to—I mean my recommendation isn’t to just—yes, the only way to break the heat at this point is a knot, but that doesn’t mean you have to—there are other avenues—”

“I’m not losing my virginity to a prostitute,” Donghyuck says loudly, with a sharpness and suddenness that he hadn’t expected. He hadn’t even intended to speak, certainly hadn’t planned on advertising his lack of experience, but now he has, and it’s out there, and Mark is looking at him with his mouth fallen open.

“You’re not—”

“Of course I’m a virgin!” Donghyuck snaps, feeling heat flood his cheeks on top of the heat-flush, and for once thankful that there’s no way the blushing is showing through because of that. “I’m a fucking idol! Who am I going to be fucking? When am I supposed to find time to be fucking? Aren’t you a virgin—” He has a moment of panic, déjà vu mixed in under his lack of inhibitions, and the conversation he and Johnny-hyung had four days before Christmas, when Donghyuck came back to their room and all the windows were open and the sheets were clean, but it still smelled very freshly of sex, and of an alpha—of Mark—is at the forefront of Donghyuck’s mind. 

Overtop Mark’s head Johnny-hyung is nervously gesturing, doing his best not to be too obvious about it, but Donghyuck looks away and bites down on his tongue regardless.

“I’m a virgin,” he says. “It has to be one of you. Please.”

Byoungjun-hyung has finished ushering the doctor out of the dorm, and now comes back to stand between them. He frowns. “Donghyuck-ah.”

“It has to be one of you,” Donghyuck says again, with his chin in the air and now only looking at Johnny-hyung overtop Mark’s head.

The dorm is silent but for the sound of their breathing, and the roaring of the blood in Donghyuck’s ears. Yuta-hyung has retreated to nearly all the way behind Jungwoo-hyung, Jaehyun-hyung is still motionless beside Taeyong-hyung, and Mark stopped breathing sometime around the virginity conversation, and only now seems to resume with a loud gasp.

“Well it can’t be me,” says Jungwoo-hyung finally, and they all turn to look at him. He shrugs, rubs at the back of his neck, and then lifts a hand. “I don’t have the right”—he makes a gesture straight out of a porno—“equipment.”

Doyoung-hyung pulls a face but doesn’t dispute that fact.

“I’m out too, then,” says Johnny-hyung, not moving from where he’s still standing behind Mark. “Uh, sorry—” Johnny-hyung is looking at Jaehyun-hyung, who’s so still that Donghyuck thinks he looks like he could be some sort of carved statue, except for how his jaw keeps twitching whenever he breathes. Johnny-hyung doesn’t look at Taeyong-hyung, whose hands are fisted by his sides, or Yuta-hyung, hidden all the way behind Jungwoo-hyung, now. (Donghyuck doesn’t really look, either, but notices anyway. Of course he notices anyway. _Fuck_.)

“I—” Yuta-hyung finally starts to say, but Mark interrupts him.

“Are we really doing this?” he says, glancing around at all of them in obvious disbelief. “Are we really doing this? Debating who”—his voice breaks but he rallies, stepping forward a little and holding to his middle like a self-hug—“Debating who’s going to—to _fuck_ Donghyuckie—”

“ _Music Bank_ is in less than twenty-four hours,” says Donghyuck before he can finish, trying for mild, and missing by a mile. He feels like he’s watching them all from the outside, like this is just a bad dream, and his subconscious has figured it out, but still can’t wake him up. (He wishes it were just only a dream. If it were a dream, once it runs its course he could wake up, be a normal temperature, put on pajamas, and go harass Taeyong-hyung into playing a round of PubG instead of— _double fuck_ —ignoring how his hindbrain wants him to fuck Taeyong-hyung’s boyfriend.)

“I know but—” Mark seems to see something in Donghyuck’s eyes because he stops talking again, still holding his stomach.“I—”

“Not you,” Donghyuck hears himself say.

Mark’s eyes look pained. “Hyuck—”

“Not you,” Donghyuck repeats again, even though he knows it’s unfair to the rest of them, to Doyoung-hyung, with his tight control and even tighter rules—to Taeyong-hyung, who would do it because he’s the leader—to Jaehyun-hyung, who would do it because he knows Donghyuck would want it to be him, if he had to, if it had to be an alpha—it has to be—it has to be an alpha—thoughts other than that are broken, and idiotic, and childish. “Not—not you, Mark-hyung.”

Mark’s expression is only worried. “Hyuck—”

Taeyong-hyung’s shoulders go back; Jaehyun-hyung’s bones seem to audibly grind with tension; Donghyuck starts to shut his eyes.

“None of you are going to do it,” says Taeil-hyung suddenly, the first time he’s spoken the entire exchange.

They all turn to look at him, the surety of his sentence silencing the room irrefutably. He stares back at them with his chin raised.

“Taeil-hyung,” Taeyong-hyung tries to say.

“None of you are going to do it,” Taeil-hyung repeats. “I’ll do it—” He stops talking and casts his gaze at Byoungjun-hyung. “Can you ask him—the doctor—is it okay if I—does it have to be a real knot—”

Donghyuck thinks unbidden of the dildo hidden in Jeno’s closet at the Dream dorm, the present all of them chipped in to give him on his eighteenth birthday, laughing and illegally tipsy and taking the utter piss. “It’s pretty and pink just like you, Haechan-hyung,” said Chenle. “It even inflates!” Donghyuck had no qualms about putting him in a headlock.

Byoungjun-hyung is already calling the doctor, tone no-nonsense and straight to the point as he gets through the question, not afraid to mince words. He hangs up before the poor man can continue speaking. “Dildos are fine.”

Mark makes another punched sounding noise, but Taeil-hyung doesn’t pay him any mind. “I’ll do it,” he says again, and then, seemingly with growing horror, turns to face Donghyuck. He comes carefully forward to stand in front of him but doesn’t bend. He doesn’t baby. He doesn’t do more than look at Donghyuck, swaddled under all his blankets and hiding a hard on that just won’t go away. He’s breathtaking enough to distract Donghyuck from all the alphas in the room, all the white noise. “Is that okay, Donghyuck-ah?” Taeil-hyung asks.

And it’s not, because Donghyuck is a fucking broken, childish _idiot,_ but he nods anyway. ( _But Jaehyun-hyung has Taeyong-hyung and Taeil-hyung is like Ten-hyung_ , the little dumb voice close to his heart tries to say and he _ignores it_ , makes it fucking disappear—) 

“Yeah,” he says. “You—yeah.”

Taeil-hyung nods. “Good,” he says. “Now all of you get out.” His expression goes apologetic, but no less hard. “None of you come back tonight.”

Doyoung-hyung sighs, but nods. “Come on,” he tells Taeyong-hyung. “I’ll fight you for the couch.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” says Jaehyun-hyung. “My bed can absolutely fit two grown men.”

“It’s true,” Jungwoo-hyung says rather miserably. “I walked in once. They weren’t wearing clothes—”

“Okay!” Mark says loudly, pulling open the door. “Okay, TMI—”

Donghyuck tunes them out in time for Yuta-hyung to start harassing Mark about the state of his sex life, and Johnny-hyung intercedes before Mark bursts into flames. He can’t believe it was only four days ago that Yuta-hyung was re-enacting Kdrama with Mark—that it was only six days ago that Yuta-hyung made Mark play pepero. 

He feels fucking lost.

The door to the dorm closes with a thud and the lock beeps.

Donghyuck holds even tighter to the blankets.

“Donghyuck-ah?” It’s Taeyong-hyung, surprisingly not having left with the others, and Donghyuck startles, looking up.

“Hyung?”

“Are you sure—”

And it’s only because of the heat, only because of the hypersensitivity, only because they lived together for almost two years give or take two world tours, but Donghyuck knows that that’s Jaehyun-hyung, in the hallway, left behind, white knuckling his own hands so hard he’s actually drawing blood. He’d have known it even if Taeyong-hyung’s gaze hadn’t gone hard for a second, but as it stands, all he can do is watch how Taeyong-hyung’s own hands clench—watch as Taeyong-hyung takes one reflexive step back. 

“Yeah, Hyung, of course,” Donghyuck says, somehow finding it in himself to stand, to smile, to put a burning hand on Taeyong-hyung’s arm, fully aware that the shirt might not survive the ensuing scramble once Jaehyun-hyung gets him back up to the tenth floor. “I’ll be fine. Taeilie-hyung is my favorite hyung, after all.”

Taeyong-hyung stares between the two of them for a long moment, then nods. “Alright,” he says. “Text me after.”

Donghyuck waves him off, doing his best to sound as insolent as possible. “Yes, Dad—”

Taeyong-hyung rolls his eyes and swats at him rather playfully but goes.

Donghyuck is left standing, alone in the center of the room.

“Donghyuck-ah?” says Taeil finally.

“Hyung,” Donghyuck manages. “I—I wasn’t lying, about the standing thing.” He hates this. He hates the weakness. He doesn’t think it’s supposed to be like this. He’s not uneducated. He sat through the lessons, bribed a manager and went to meet with U-Know Yunho-sunbaenim, and has read more about this than the rest of the band combined. Donghyuck’s no stranger to his body and perfectly versed in the ins and outs of the heat cycle but this is so much worse than he’d thought it would be. He wonders if it’s due to more than just living out of pocket with six alphas. He wonders if it’s because they’ve all started to pair off. If it’s… dumb—

Taeil-hyung puts a hand on Donghyuck’s shoulder, tentative and perfectly composed. “Do you—want help—”

“I want a shower,” Donghyuck manages, feeling unclean and finally free to panic about it. His thighs are disgusting. The jeans are ruined. “I—Hyung—”

“Yes, of course,” says Taeil-hyung, and doesn’t bat an eye when Donghyuck has to practically sprawl all over him the whole walk to the bathroom. He doesn’t flinch when Donghyuck needs to be helped into the stall, doesn’t comment when Donghyuck can’t make his mouth ask him to stay outside the curtain. He does it anyway, silent and steady and unjudging. It’s awful. Donghyuck feels awful. The shower is too cold, but the faucet is turned all the way to the left.

“You’re doing really well this variety cycle, Haechan-ah,” Taeil-hyung says, after a few minutes of quiet.

Donghyuck had been doing his best to actually wash up and not just shove four fingers inside himself in an attempt to end this before it can even begin. Stupid. He’s so stupid. So stupid. So dumb. “T-thank you, Taeilie-hyung,” he says. “You too.”

* * *

Donghyuck’s dildo is, as mentioned, at the Dream dorm, but Byoungjun-hyung offers to go get it without so much as a pause when Taeil-hyung phones him. He’s clearly up on the tenth floor with the rest of them, because Donghyuck’s hearing is just hyperaware enough that he now knows that it’s only Taeil-hyung’s quick thinking that keeps him from having to share sex toys with Taeyong-hyung and Jaehyun-hyung.

“Thank you,” he says when Taeil-hyung has hung up, and they’ve returned to sitting in silence on opposite sides of the living room. They’re only doing this because going into the bedroom would make it real, and despite the countdown looming over their heads (and the fact that Donghyuck is only not jerking off because he’s holding tightly to a glass of water with both hands), Donghyuck isn’t ready for it to be real. “The entire point of you doing this is to help me not have any part of Jaehyun-hyung in my ass.” He pauses. “I mean not—I mean they’d clean it, obviously—but I—fuck—”

“Hyuck-ah,” Taeil-hyung says. “Breathe.”

Donghyuck finds himself doing so, and sort of hates how easy it is for him to automatically follow commands. He laughs, searching for something resembling self-deprecation. “Taeyongie-hyung should assign chores when I’m like—in heat,” he says. “I wouldn’t even argue about having to be the one to wash the floors.”

Taeil-hyung shoots him an odd look—funny, once Donghyuck thinks about how Taeil-hyung and Taeyong-hyung did share a room for nearly two years.

“I’m kidding,” he says helpfully. He’s back to hiding under the blankets to save face, and while they’re stifling and uncomfortable, at least they provide him with some modicum of modesty. The tent in his boxers isn’t nearly so obvious; the slick wetting the back of his legs isn’t getting all over the couch. He’s sitting on a towel anyway, trying to decide if this is all normal—the SM doctor said it was, after examining Donghyuck in the bathroom with Johnny-hyung pointedly standing guard because Donghyuck was fucking twenty, however much that mattered—or if it’s overkill because Taeyong-hyung has a massive dick, or something. Sure, Donghyuck has the dildo currently in Dream’s dorm, but even he doesn’t think this level of lubrication is really necessary. But then again he’s only ever seen real knots in porn, or when Jaehyun-hyung dropped his towel because he thought no one was looking—and Donghyuck really _wasn’t_ it was just Jaehyun-hyung was very pretty and an alpha and _there_. He’d done the same to Mark when they lived together but Mark was about as late a bloomer as Donghyuck, and also seemed to have even more hang-ups about his biology.

And Mark didn’t even have a working set of ovaries or the occasional urge to go belly down for more than half the band.

There was truly _no way_ Mark could have been the one to fix this.

Donghyuck has digressed horribly. He casts a look back at Taeil-hyung and finds that he hasn’t disappeared into his phone, as Donghyuck would have done. Instead he’s just quietly looking around the apartment, not boring holes into Donghyuck with his eyes. That’s good. Donghyuck doesn’t know what his face was doing for that little moment of introspection, but it can’t have been.

Donghyuck should think of other, more boring things. Like how long it might take someone to get to Dream’s dorm now that they’re not in the same building. Or what sort of shit Jeno might say, when faced with Byoungjun-hyung and the odd request. He wonders how long it’ll be until his heat is the latest gossip at the NCT watering hole, thinks maybe he ought to apologize to Lucas-hyung for those things he said about him and Yunho-sunbaenim last October.

He pointedly doesn’t think about Lucas-hyung and Ten-hyung, who make it work in spades.

He opens his mouth.

There’s a knock at the door—one thud—and Donghyuck nearly takes off his tongue.

“Is that—”

“It’s not Byoungjun-hyung, it’s—”

“Taeil-hyung, it’s me,” says Jaehyun-hyung, from right outside the door.

“—Jaehyun-hyung,” Donghyuck finishes. “What—”

“I brought the dildo,” Jaehyun-hyung adds, because he has utterly no shame. Donghyuck should know. He lived with the man for almost two years. Also, the entire band is now intimately aware of the fact that Jaehyun likes to have the back of his neck gnawed on, so it’s safe to say they _all_ know.

Taeil-hyung gets up to grab the item in question without so much as waiting for Donghyuck to say anything. “Coming.” He pulls open the door and takes the spare shopping bag Dream threw it in without comment. Then he goes to close the door, only Jaehyun-hyung takes a step into the dorm before he can do so.

“Donghyuck,” says Jaehyun-hyung, looking at Donghyuck with large, unreadable eyes. “Haechannie. I—”

Donghyuck stares at him from his cocoon of blankets and knows what he’s going to say before he’s even finished. “Yah,” he says. “Are you sure the two of you are deeply and embarrassingly in love?”

Jaehyun-hyung blinks. “I’m sorry?”

“Taeyongie-hyung,” Donghyuck says. “You.”

Jaehyun-hyung’s got a hand on his own chest and his brow furrowed. “Me—”

“Are you sure you’re really head over heels in love?” Donghyuck says. “As good as mated? Justifiably so sickening to the point where Jungwoo-hyung may never forgive you for as long as you live? _Soulmates_ —”

That last one actually seems to make Jaehyun-hyung blush, but he keeps staring Donghyuck down. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m fine, Jaehyun-hyung, thanks. Do you want me to touch your shirt _too_ so that Taeyong-hyung has an excuse to rip it off when you get back upstairs?”

Jaehyun-hyung’s ears go pink.

Donghyuck finds it in him to soften his tone. “Look, thank you, I’m grateful, really, but the doctor said it will be fine and Taeilie-hyung really would have been my first choice if he had the correct anatomy so.” Somehow he didn’t stumble over that sentence, nor give in to the urge to see how Taeil-hyung feels about everything Donghyuck has said. “You can go back up to your boyfriend, Jaehyun-hyung,” Donghyuck says. “I’m fine. Thank you.”

Jaehyun-hyung keeps looking at him for a long time—Donghyuck remembers abruptly that Jaehyun-hyung _knows_ —but then he nods, and smiles, and goes to step back out of the dorm. “Hyung—”

“I’ll take care of him,” Taeil-hyung says, making Donghyuck’s traitor stomach start to roll into stupidly giddy knots. “Bye, Jaehyunnie.” He shuts the door. He sets down the bag.

Donghyuck somehow manages to stand. “Well?” He lets the blankets drop to the ground around him, standing there wearing nothing but boxers and his own slick.

“Bedroom, probably,” says Taeil-hyung, voice low.

It—

Donghyuck is so very, very dumb.

* * *

He locks Taeil-hyung out of the room and goes in alone with the inflatable dildo, which is higher quality than he’d remembered, but then that’s Zhong Chenle for you. The mechanics of the thing are somewhat beyond Donghyuck at this point, but it’s easy enough to get into bed and get naked, to swipe his fingers through his own lubrication and determine that there really is no need for him to be working his way up there first with fingers. Donghyuck gets in the bed and lies on his back and shoves the toy where he wants and it. He stares at the ceiling with his breath coming in awful, awful gasps, listening with more than one ear to the pound of Taeil-hyung’s heartbeat outside the door.

Taeil-hyung’s talking about their schedule: _Music Bank_ tomorrow, _Music Core_ after, then _Inkigayo_ and _Weekly Idol_. The so far unnamed V LIVE relay planned for the first week of April, when the both of them are due in the recording booth working on the _Neo Zone_ repackage, whether Taeyong-hyung will dye his hair for the repackage. It’s the sort of thing Donghyuck would do to fill the silence, but it’s not helping.

“Hyung!” he says loudly, unable to modulate the tone of his voice and stop from shouting. “Please stop talking! It really isn’t”—hot? Shouldn’t be hot? _Is_ hot, what the fuck—“helping,” Donghyuck finishes with what he hopes is a pause that Taeil-hyung either won’t notice or will attribute to the heat.

Taeil-hyung doesn’t answer him, thankfully.

“Sorry,” Donghyuck finds himself saying. He somehow feels even worse, now that there’s no chatter. He curses the fact that his bed is the one closest to the door—that Taeil-hyung is, apparently—“Are you right outside the door?”

“I’m not moving,” Taeil-hyung says immediately. “Donghyuck, I’m sorry.”

Donghyuck is confused and significantly more aroused now that Taeil-hyung is talking again, but he’s going to pretend that’s only because it fools his brain into thinking he’s with someone, not just with his dildo and right hand. He plants his feet against the bed and fucks his hips down onto the inflatable knot and tries to remember if there was an instruction manual included. He knows the thing has a pump, but also, he’s pretty sure it vibrates? Was that a thing Chenle had said, when he presented it, cackling the entire time? Donghyuck can’t remember—doesn’t even know if he can reach where he left the shopping bag it came in. But since it’s a pump, it’s not possible to mess it up without the remote, right? Like. It’s—it should be straight forward?

He has a sudden fear that he’s going to fuck it up—that the knot will just keep inflating and then get stuck—and it’s like an ice bath dumped over all the heat. Donghyuck whines, pitiful and terrified and unable to freeze his hips fully because it feels so fucking _good_ to be full. “Oh fuck,” he mumbles, confused because he’s not full enough and shaking. “Where’s the—fuck—the remote?”

“Donghyuckie?” Taeil-hyung’s tone is unreadable, but it’s balm to Donghyuck’s soul anyway.

“I’m fine,” Donghyuck says, trying to remember how to control his emotions because he can taste his own fear and it’s definitely not making things better. He needs a distraction. He needs Taeil-hyung to come up with a distraction. “W-why are you sorry?”

Taeil-hyung stays quiet for a moment, and Donghyuck can hear… typing? The clack of keys? Why’s Taeil-hyung got his phone off silent? Donghyuck can’t focus. Donghyuck can’t breathe.

Taeil-hyung’s words sound very far away, but they break through anyway. “I’m not leaving,” he says again. “I know you don’t like—I know you’re not mine—”

Donghyuck bites down on his tongue so hard he swears he tastes blood.

“But I’m not moving,” Taeil-hyung says. “You’re my family. I have to stay here.”

This was a mistake. Donghyuck should have ruined his relationship with Mark instead; should have risked never being called ‘baby’ by Jaehyun-hyung again by letting Taeyong-hyung be the leader instead. “That’s—” he starts to say. “Well if you’re—” he starts to say. “If you’re going to be out there anyway—”

Taeil-hyung makes a noise—the first slip in his composure since this nightmare started—and Donghyuck is still fucking himself on a dildo because he can’t _stop_.

“You should come inside the room,” Donghyuck says. Somehow, he doesn’t say, ‘you should come inside _me_ ,’ and that’s. That’s worth the orgasm that washes over him, honestly. He’s not really sure how it works—certainly outside of heat he wouldn’t even dream of coming untouched—but afterwards Donghyuck just sort of feels hazy, floating in the center of his bed with his breaths coming in audible puffs, gazing blankly up at the ceiling. He’s made a mess of his chest, and his dick hasn’t even gone soft. “Hyung?” he says.

“You don’t really want that,” says Taeil-hyung.

 _Fuck him_. “Fuck you,” Donghyuck says, because in heat, he has even less of a filter.

“You don’t want that either,” says Taeil-hyung.

The air goes out of Donghyuck in one pained gasp and he lets go of the dildo but leaves it inside himself because he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to pull it out if he tries. Then he scoots up the bed until he hits the headboard, dragging both hands over his cheeks and trying so very hard to be calm. “Taeilie-hyung,” he says quietly. “I—I’m—” _Scared_ , he can’t say. Scared of his body and the toy and that it won’t help, because Taeil-hyung’s just a beta, even if he is Donghyuck’s beta, even if Donghyuck wants him in ways he shouldn’t because Taeil-hyung’s a beta and Donghyuck’s just the baby. “I need”— _you—_ “your help. Please.”

There’s only silence.

Donghyuck is worried he’s _ruined it_.

“Donghyuck-ah,” Taeil-hyung says. “You need to unlock the door.”

Donghyuck doesn’t know how he’s expected to get off the bed. “I don’t think I can,” he says. His voice comes out small and unrecognizable and he _hates_ this. He holds his hands over his eyes harder and wills himself not to cry, tells himself he won’t cry, worries about the mechanics of the dildo and fights back the urge to say fuck _it_ and fuck _himself_. 

Taeil-hyung is swearing. Taeil-hyung is swearing and picking the lock and his phone is definitely not on silent because Donghyuck can hear the sound of him getting a text—three texts, in quick succession—and then the door is open and Taeil-hyung is in the room, his scent washing over Donghyuck entirely unfiltered, and Donghyuck can only stare and sucks in horrible, horrible air filled with the smell of him.

It only hurts because it’s not enough. It only hurts when Taeil-hyung looks at him—at the pink, flushed, _wet_ mess that is Donghyuck—and says nothing. Donghyuck takes his hands off the dildo—when had he put them back on it—and does his very best not to die.

“I—” says Taeil-hyung finally. “I thought you said—remote.”

Donghyuck covers his face with both hands. “I think it vibrates.”

Taeil-hyung has never been as light on his feet—not as good of a dancer as some of them—as Taeyong-hyung—but his voice is suddenly closer and Donghyuck swears he hadn’t heard him walking; there were no footsteps, no stumbling, just silence in between the roar of blood in his ears. “You think it vibrates,” Taeil-hyung says.

“I think it vibrates,” Donghyuck verifies, peeking through his fingers at Taeil-hyung. He’s unreadable: mouth a line, eyes giving away nothing (staring; only staring; staring at Donghyuck, who is pink, flushed, and _wet_ —in heat). Donghyuck puts his palms back over his eyes. “I think Chenle said it vibrates.”

Taeil-hyung mutters something that sounds an awful lot like, “Chenle is _dead to me_ and _useless_ ,” and his tone is just angry enough that Donghyuck feels his knees shake and his heart pound in response. He wants to go belly down, and he really only wants to go belly down for select people. Most of NCT 127 has gotten angry enough with Donghyuck to use an alpha tone on him; Donghyuck prides himself on it, but only Taeil-hyung… Donghyuck wouldn’t dream of ever getting in lordosis position for the likes of fucking Mark Lee, or Kim Doyoung. He might do it for Taeyong-hyung, but that’s because he’s the leader and knows how to be scary, and Jaehyun-hyung… Donghyuck doesn’t want to think about Jaehyun-hyung. Honestly, he thinks he’s trying to distract himself from the more pressing thing, which is Taeil-hyung, standing before him with infinite patience.

Donghyuck is naked.

Donghyuck is naked with a vibrating, inflatable dildo up his ass.

He’s in _heat_.

He—

“I’m afraid I’m going to mess it up.” Donghyuck says, voice a horrible, shy thing. _I’m afraid I’m going to mess the two of_ us _up_ , he doesn’t say, but thinks hard enough to draw blood. He couldn’t bear—he doesn’t want—that’s his _Taeil-hyung_ , his rock since Donghyuck was nothing more than a kid. He didn’t have these feelings when he was a kid. He didn’t—he didn’t want—he _knew better_.

“Donghyuckie.” Taeil-hyung is so close now that Donghyuck yelps, pulling his fingers down just so he can see. Taeil-hyung hasn’t gotten on the bed and isn’t looking at anything other than Donghyuck’s eyes, but he’s breathing funny and there is a flush across both his cheeks; some part of Donghyuck positively _delights_ in that—wants to take a picture, frame the feeling, and milk it until Taeil-hyung is _angry_. “I need you to tell me I can touch you.”

And that—that’s— _kind_. Donghyuck lowers his hands even farther, dropping the physical barriers when he can’t bring himself to let down the mental ones, and swallows with careful slowness. His voice is going, and he needs to say this. Taeil-hyung needs him to say this. Taeil-hyung may _touch him_. “I need you to help me, Taeil-hyung,” Donghyuck says, voice a hoarse whisper. “Please?”

Taeil-hyung’s nostrils flare, his jaw twitches, and carefully—like gentling a wild horse—he puts a knee on the bed. Instinct is telling Donghyuck that he should roll over and get in position, but he fights it, starts gnawing on the inside of his cheek and keeps going even when it hurts. Taeil-hyung is fully clothed and trying his best to be unruffled, but every step closer makes Donghyuck’s skin itch and his breath hitch. He shouldn’t feel like this. He shouldn’t want it like this. Taeil-hyung _isn’t an alpha_ , and Donghyuck _knows better_. He has three baby siblings and the family name to carry on, and even if he’s not what his dad wanted for a firstborn, Donghyuck will carry on the family name—with an alpha—never mind that betas can get him pregnant too—with a _girl alpha_ —and he’ll—he’ll sire the children.

“Hey.” Taeil-hyung’s fingers land comfortingly on Donghyuck’s shoulders—a surprisingly chaste gesture for the situation: Donghyuck naked, sweating, and already out two orgasms; Taeil-hyung clothed, breathing hard, and very kindly not looking at more than Donghyuck’s eyes. “Donghyuck-ah.” He’s not calling Donghyuck Haechan. He hasn’t since he came in the room—since the clothes came off, and the reality of the situation sunk all the way in. “Breathe.”

Donghyuck hadn’t been aware that he’d _stopped_ , but the moment Taeil-hyung mentions it he notices. His lungs _ache_ , and the noise that comes out when he exhales sounds embarrassingly like a sob. “Fuck,” Donghyuck swears, because there are no cameras and he can. “This is the worst day of my life.” He doesn’t think Taeil-hyung had meant for him to see, but Donghyuck does anyway. The tiniest bit of hurt, flashing in Taeil-hyung’s pretty, pretty eyes, and his own little exhale. Disappointment—Donghyuck drags the feeling across the roof of his mouth with all of his exceedingly high test scores and frowns—embarrassment? Sadness? Taeil-hyung shouldn’t be sad, wouldn’t be disappointed, and is justified in being embarrassed.

Donghyuck feels shy and twitchy, and really he’d like to get the dildo out of his ass, now, thanks. “It’s not really the worst day of my life,” he says, because he feels like if he doesn’t keep talking he might say something _worse_. “It’s just—I feel like an idiot—how do you _do that_ , anyway? Make me spill my guts.”

“It’s all part of my charm,” Taeil-hyung says. He’s still kneeling on the bed with his hands on Donghyuck’s shoulders, and finally—blessedly—Donghyuck feels himself start to relax.

Other parts of him tense right back up, but where it counts—in his bones, down by his soul, in his—fuck—heart—he feels calm. “I think there’s a pump,” he manages. “Could you—please”

Taeil-hyung’s fingers bite into Donghyuck’s shoulders for two seconds and he yelps, high and startled and _loud_. “Sorry.” Taeil-hyung takes his hands back and now Donghyuck sobs, slumping back onto the bed like a puppet with cut strings. “Sorry.” Taeil-hyung doesn’t understand and that only makes Donghyuck hate himself more, because they should understand each other perfectly because Taeil-hyung is Donghyuck’s m—hyung, and here to help.

“It’s fine,” Donghyuck says breathlessly, staring up at the ceiling and letting himself marvel at how out of control the situation has become. He’s still hard. He still feels two seconds from another orgasm, no matter how very much he’d also like to climb in a hole. Heat is fucking transcendent. “I’m fine.”

He’s not fine, but Taeil-hyung very kindly doesn’t mention. “It’s just a pump,” he says finally, and Donghyuck doesn’t start laughing like a deranged idiot. “And—uh—a remote.” Taeil-hyung must have grabbed the bag, or something, to find out. “Um.” There’s another pause, and Donghyuck keeps making friends with the ceiling. “The instructions are in Chinese.” Another pause. “I _really_ don’t read Chinese.” Yet another pause. “I guess I should just—” And then there is a click, a rather foreboding humming, and… oh.

Donghyuck makes a punched, wounded noise, body arching off the bed and all ten toes curling, because Donghyuck might be a distracted idiot who’s having trouble doing more than counting the cracks in his and Johnny-hyung’s ceiling, but his body isn’t. His body understands what’s going on, feels the vibrations right up against that spot inside of him that makes his head spin and _lurches_ , flailing around not at all gracefully, and not letting up until Donghyuck has come, twice in what has to be under twenty minutes, and still fucking… wet.

“Shit,” Taeil-hyung says, switching the thing off after what feels like a lifetime of pause. “Uh—are you—do you need—”

“Maybe”—man words are hard right now, _fuck_ —“maybe we lay off on the—remote,” Donghyuck manages to pant out eventually. “You know just until”—he gets one of the appendages he thinks is his hand in the air and waves it about in a manner he hopes provides suitable emphasis—“I’m not two seconds from coming my brains out for the third time.”

There’s more silence from Taeil-hyung, punctuated by what Donghyuck’s potentially bleeding ears think might be something like, “the _third_ time,” said with quite a lot of vitriol, but that makes no sense, because why would Taeil-hyung be mad about that? “Right,” Taeil-hyung says. “That makes sense.” He goes quiet, and Donghyuck lets himself take a moment just to breathe. “But are you sure—” Taeil-hyung’s trigger happy with the remote and Donghyuck can tell, didn’t spend the last five or so years in a band with him not to know what that tone of his voice _means_ , so he sits up, wincing as the move tugs the semi-inflated, expensive bit of plastic cock out of him, and scrabbles for the remote.

“I’m sure,” he says, hand shaking because of the orgasms and not because Taeil-hyung is fucking _mean_ in bed, and that’s wrecking him. (Of course Taeil-hyung would be. Taeil-hyung is nice everywhere else, except when it comes to criticizing his own singing, and when people give their members unnecessary grief. Taeil-hyung would be Donghyuck’s oversized teddy bear and personal battery charger, but messy and _mean_ in bed. It’s everything Donghyuck would want out of the—a relationship. It scares him right out of his mind.)

Taeil-hyung lets go of the remote without a fight, and only grins when Donghyuck hurls the thing across the room out of reach. It hits the floor with a crack that might be breaking, but Donghyuck doesn’t care. The dildo doesn’t start buzzing nonstop, and that’s really all that matters. “You don’t think that’s overkill?”

“I think you’re overkill,” Donghyuck snaps back, and takes advantage of the reprieve to finally scoot himself up towards the headboard. It makes him feel more in charge, and less like a teenage idiot.

Taeil-hyung just keeps smiling at him, hands settling back into his lap. He’s still on his knees at the end of the bed, and he’s wearing all of his clothes.

It makes Donghyuck want to fight. “You’re way too dressed,” he says.

Taeil-hyung just keeps smiling, expression mild. Maybe he didn’t hear.

“Hyung,” Donghyuck says, louder. “You’re wearing too many clothes.”

Taeil-hyung seems to startle, then looks almost apologetic. “Oh.” He’s still got his hands folded on top of his thighs and something of his idol mask in place; Donghyuck wants to punch him in the teeth, then kiss away the hurt, then climb in his lap and onto his dick and ride him for at least _five hours_ ; Donghyuck isn’t helping himself, because clearly he’s lost all sense and only has heat brain. “I don’t really think that’s necessary, do you?”

Donghyuck doesn’t know whether he wants to laugh or cry. Necessary? _Necessary_? Like this is some sort of—business transaction—two friends, making a fuck or die pact, nothing more. (It is. It is. It _is_.) “I want you to take your clothes off,” he says, and tells himself it’s heat brain, and nothing he’d say sober.

Taeil-hyung’s eyes flash for a brief second and Donghyuck’s head spins. “Hyuck…”

“I _want you to take your clothes off_ ,” Donghyuck says again, too much petulance thrown into the sentence but unable to help himself. “I—your shirt, at least.”

Taeil-hyung doesn’t look like he’d discipline Donghyuck— _spank him_ , his stupid, stupid brain whispers—but he still isn’t moving, and Donghyuck feels actual tears start in the corners of his eyes.

“ _Fuck_!” he cries again, swiping angrily at them because _what the fuck_. “Fuck! I—shut up—”

“I haven’t said anything.” Taeil-hyung has his hands in the air and is still the picture of composure. Donghyuck feels like a baby, like an idiot, like a kid with a crush getting turned down.

“Do you”—the tears haven’t gone away and he can’t do anything about it because he’s a fucking bucket of _hormones_ —“do you not want—”

“Oh, Haechannie, Donghyuck, no.” Taeil-hyung comes scooting up the bed to tug Donghyuck in for a hug that only makes him want to cry harder—fuck if that’s embarrassing, and fuck if Donghyuck will _not_ ; this is just Taeil-hyung doing him a favor, and Donghyuck is still too much of a coward to do more than hug him and tell him he’s his favorite whenever they’re not on camera. “I just—if you need—”

This is mean. Donghyuck is _mean_. Donghyuck knows more than the rest of them why Taeil-hyung wouldn’t want to go shirtless. He’s only been fighting it since they started making fun of him for working out. He does work out, his exercise equipment left on both floors of their dorm because they really don’t discriminate, but he’s still—shy. “I need,” Donghyuck says—the heat says— _Donghyuck says_ , and shuts his eyes, buries his face in Taeil-hyung’s neck, chokes on sobs. _Fuck_ , he thinks. _Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck_.

The heat in his stomach churns.

“Donghyuck-ah.” Taeil-hyung’s words come out directly into Donghyuck’s hair.

“It’s fine,” he says, pulling away and refusing to look, to let his other senses listen. “It’s fine. I don’t need—I was lying. You can just—I know how to work the thing, now, so.” He goes back against the bed, lies down before he can second guess, and fumbles for the dildo. He comes up empty—Taeil-hyung definitely presses it into his fingers—but once he has it he _has it_ , and it’s less hard to get it where he wants it now. Donghyuck puts his arm over his eyes and his inflatable fake cock up his ass, and doesn’t think about Taeil-hyung watching, smelling, _seeing_. He doesn’t think about the view—how he’s up by the headboard not just to put his head on the pillows and be in charge, but so that Taeil-hyung can see, halfway down the bed in full dress and idol smile. Donghyuck’s body was made for this—made to take cock—and he wants Taeil-hyung to _see_ , to _know_ , to have front row seats to the slide of the bit of plastic into him, no resistance, no lube needed, no foreplay.

Foreplay probably wouldn’t hurt.

Foreplay probably _could hurt_.

Foreplay would be nice, if Taeil—

Donghyuck puts his arm between his teeth and bites, exhaling through his nose.

“Hyuck-ah.” Donghyuck doesn’t want to know what Taeil-hyung is doing to make his voice come out like that.

“It’s okay,” Donghyuck says, realizing to touch himself he’ll need to take his hand away from his face and unwilling to do that because it’s his only protection. “I’m okay. You don’t need to”— _kiss me_ —“stay.” As he speaks, he ruins the angle and groans, letting the dildo and squirming petulantly against the bed. It’s good and Donghyuck is full and no longer aching but he can’t get the angle right, and he doesn’t have a hand for his cock.

Maybe that’s a good thing.

Maybe that means Donghyuck is actually getting better—his heat is passing—because he doesn’t think he could come on just the fake cock.

“Here.” Taeil-hyung is closer and Donghyuck almost bites off his own tongue. “Let me—you need—Hyuck-ah—”

Donghyuck lets Taeil-hyung put his hands on the dildo and resume thrusting, doing his best not to shake out of his skin or cause irreparable damage to his own arm. He tries to think desperately of tomorrow’s stage costumes, trying to remember if he’ll have to wear sleeves—if a stylist-noona might kill him for ruining her carefully orchestrated plans, showing up with a fresh bruise. Donghyuck is the teenager, the baby, the maknae, and he is not allowed to be bruised. “It’s too slow,” he forces himself to say, trying for cool, and probably failing soundly. “Too”—soft, not enough, not you—“gentle.”

Taeil-hyung pauses—something Donghyuck only notices because he’s currently working a dildo into his ass—but when he continues his strokes are more solid, the lines of the dildo dragging along Donghyuck’s rim just so.

Fuck.

That was.

That was something Donghyuck had read about, in pamphlets.

Seen in porn.

Talked about it with Jeno and Chenle under cover of night, cackling because they were young and idiotic.

“Better,” he gasps out, dropping his arm and turning his face so that he still doesn’t have to see. “Thank you—oh—” That’s probably for using the less formal, for the slip into banmal, even though Taeil-hyung really doesn’t care, when they’re alone. When there are others he fusses because he has to, but when they’re alone. They could have been same aged friends, if Donghyuck wanted to press the issue.

Donghyuck wants to press.

Donghyuck wants to come.

Donghyuck _doesn’t_ want to come. Not like this, not without—Taeil-hyung.

He opens his eyes, startled, gasping, and weak. “Wait.”

Taeil-hyung doesn’t wait, follows Donghyuck when he tries to twist and move up the bed. “Shh.” He puts a hand on Donghyuck’s hip to hold and his fingers feel like ice. “Hyuck-ah—don’t hurt yourself.”

Donghyuck wonders why Taeil-hyung is saying that, then looks down to see the state of himself, and gets it. “Oh,” he says, staring. “Oh—I—you could—” Taeil-hyung’s fingers only close around Donghyuck’s cock long enough to place Donghyuck’s own hand there, and Donghyuck makes a pitiful, tragic mewl. It’s too much and not enough being touched by—Taeil-hyung—someone else. It makes Donghyuck’s toes curl and his thighs shake, his breath catch and his heart race. He moans, a high, needy thing, and gives his cock one long stroke.

“Good boy,” Taeil-hyung says, and Donghyuck fucking… goes. “Bad boy,” Taeil-hyung continues, still going at it with the dildo, and Donghyuck forces his eyes open so that he can look at him. Taeil-hyung isn’t looking back, gaze fixed on the slide of cock in and out of Donghyuck’s ass, but also at the mess on his stomach, the throb of his still hard dick. Taeil-hyung is distracted, he’s—he’s hard in his pants—and Donghyuck feels the roar of some ancient beast start to deafen his ears.

“Take your shirt off,” he tries, breathless and already starting the fourth climb—he’ll come dry this time he thinks, surely, yes. “Take your shirt off.”

Taeil-hyung peels the shirt off with one rippling arm, only looks away long enough to drag it off over his dominant hand, and then goes back to screwing Donghyuck’s brains out with single minded focus. He’s definitely distracted, definitely not really listening, and Donghyuck hadn’t known… hadn’t dared to ask.

He tastes the air and finds it utterly saturated, heat and sex and desire running in one great feedback loop and making Donghyuck leak even more, because it’s not just Donghyuck’s wanting. It’s Taeil-hyung’s hesitation underneath the cloy of Donghyuck’s slick and arousal. Taeil-hyung wants him, even if it is only instinct. He took his shirt off for Donghyuck. He took his shirt off.

He’s glorious, corded muscle but soft in places because he’s not quite willing to swear off food like Jaehyun and Johnny—Donghyuck has words that could be polite but he can’t find it in himself to use them when he’s like this, panting, moaning, getting his brains fucked out by Moon Taeil, the love of his life.

Only.

 _Shit_.

No.

Not that.

Not that.

Not that.

Taeil-hyung. His friend, Taeil-hyung. His family, Taeil-hyung. His member. Sweet, funny, teasing, _beta_ Taeil-hyung, who’d flee with embarrassment if he realized Donghyuck was checking him out.

“Haechan-ah.” If Taeil-hyung feels uncomfortable being half naked he certainly doesn’t show it, staring at Donghyuck with half lidded eyes. His grip on the dildo doesn’t falter, but he lets it slow, nudging it so that it rests just out of reach of where Donghyuck wants it most, inflated enough to make him groan.

“You—” Donghyuck tries to say. “I—”

“Me,” Taeil-hyung repeats. “You.” He practically oozes sex, and Donghyuck doesn’t know quite what to do about that. He feels raw, exposed, and so close he could fight someone, but under it all he’s cold, worried, scared. He feels like he’s done something wrong—ruined Taeil-hyung somehow, because this. He hadn’t known betas could be overcome by mating pheromones. He hadn’t thought—

Donghyuck hates this and hates heat. Donghyuck hates that this is as close as he’ll get to having Taeil-hyung. Donghyuck worries and fears and doesn’t know what he’ll do if this ruins things—if this is how he _ruins_ Taeil-hyung, and things never be the same.

“Donghyuck-ah.” That’s his real name, and Donghyuck finally looks up. He meets Taeil-hyung’s eyes and breathes. Taeil-hyung is—Taeil-hyung looks back, panicked, turned on, but _real_ , and Donghyuck stops trying to work himself into a panic. Taeil-hyung isn’t overcome. Taeil-hyung is—is—is _acting_ , or putting on a role, or being Donghyuck’s _hyung_ , in charge, okay, ready to do what needs to be done because he’s the oldest, Hyuck-ah, I’ll watch your back, no need to watch mine. (Donghyuck wants to watch his back. Donghyuck wants to have his back _forever_ , til death do us part. Donghyuck is broken, and stupid, and wet.) Taeil-hyung’s breath is coming faster and his eyes are just a shade too bright and his hands are maybe shaking, now that they’re not busy fucking Donghyuck’s ass.

Donghyuck wants to cry.

Donghyuck could just die.

“Taeilie-hyung,” he says, a mess.

Taeil-hyung touches him. It’s there and done too fast for Donghyuck to even savor; a barely there touch to his cheek with surprisingly cool fingers—not dry, because nothing of them is dry at this point, _fuck_ —and Donghyuck chases them when they leave. _Don’t go. Don’t—please_.

“Donghyuckie it’s okay,” Taeil-hyung says, with a kind, steady smile. “We’ll be okay. You’re fine. It’ll be over soon.”

Donghyuck doesn’t know if he wants to hug him or kiss him or _shake him_. He tries to sit up, tries to press closer so that he can—fuck—kiss.

Taeil-hyung puts a gentle hand in the center of his chest and presses him back down. Donghyuck goes, because this close he can feel the tremors, and see the whites of Taeil-hyung’s eyes. A favor. Taeil-hyung is doing this as a favor. It’s not. Anything. More.

“Stop it.” Donghyuck still wants to cry, and just might cry again, is just fucking _awful_ because of the utter fucking _weakness_ , the utter lack of control. “You don’t—you don’t have to—I don’t want to. Hyung.”

“Haechan.”

“I’m sorry.” Donghyuck feels miserable and messy and stupid and pained. “You don’t have to take your shirt off.”

Taeil-hyung doesn’t even seem to have noticed, stares down at his bare chest with bald surprise, a blush filling out his cheeks, streaking the tips of his ears.

“You don’t have to”—use your words Lee Donghyuck, because otherwise you’re just a fucking child—“make me come.”

Taeil-hyung’s eyes go dark.

Donghyuck is too tired to fight the part of himself that thinks it’s because he wants him.

“No,” Taeil-hyung says quietly. “I’m alright, Haechannie. No.”

“No?” Donghyuck says back, confused. He feels disoriented because it’s been so long between orgasms that no matter of ice-bucket realizations or fears of ruining his favorite relationship could stop the heat. His dick has been rock hard the entire conversation and then some, and now that Taeil-hyung has gone back to the dildo—now that Taeil-hyung has let the air out so he can work Donghyuck right back to knotting like a fucking asshole—it’s more than confusing. _No_ , Taeil-hyung says, but _yes_ , Taeil-hyung does. “No?” Donghyuck puts his hand on his own cock, the other on his chest, and pinches a nipple because he knows he likes it and maybe if he’s pretty enough Taeil-hyung will bite him on it. (Maybe Taeil-hyung will bite him on his neck, right along the collarbone, give him mate marks along with a mind-blowing fourth orgasm.) 

“No,” Taeil-hyung says. “I don’t have to make you come.”

For a second Donghyuck is too heat-struck to realize those are his own words, not a denial. He lets go of his nipple long enough to push more properly off the bed, whining when it ruins Taeil-hyung’s rhythm but doing it anyway because now he can—yes—

“Haechan-ah.” Taeil-hyung sounds breathless but doesn’t stop. He grabs and resituates the dildo, the angle a little less perfect now that Donghyuck has climbed all the way into his lap. Donghyuck doesn’t care. Donghyuck has to fight not to kiss him, now that they’re nose to nose.

“Donghyuck,” Donghyuck corrects, focusing on the name. He shouldn’t be Haechan here, like this. Here there should only be Donghyuck—and Moon Taeil.

“Donghyuckie,” Taeil-hyung agrees. He doesn’t kiss him, but Donghyuck thinks—maybe—if he dared, Taeil-hyung might. “You’re going to come.” Taeil-hyung has taken up the dildo again, and even goes so far to slap Donghyuck’s hands away from his own cock—how he does it, Donghyuck doesn’t know, because he’s too distracted by all the places they’re touching. “You’re going to come. You are going to come _now_ , when I say, because I want you to.”

“Hyung—”

“Donghyuck-ah,” Taeil-hyung repeats, a growl, and starts to work on the pump again.

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

“I want you,” Donghyuck sobs, no longer touching his own dick because Taeil-hyung said so, hadn’t he, and slapped his hands away—as close to him touching Donghyuck as Donghyuck is going to get today, tonight, forever. “I want you—why can’t I have you—oh please.” His skin feels hot, his throat feels raw, he can’t think, can’t speak, can only sob, shivering, as Taeil-hyung works the dildo in and out of him with careful, probing surety, and alternates with the pump, so every other stroke is just that much more extreme. The drag hurts. The drag is everything. The drag is not enough. “I don’t want to,” Donghyuck lies, hips working in counter to his protests. “I don’t want to. Give me your cock, Taeilie-hyung, please. Give me your dick. Give me your”—he almost says knot and _hates_ himself for it, entertains calling up Ten-hyung and bribing him so he’ll buy him better toys—“I don’t want it. I need _you_ , Taeilie-hyung _please_. Please. _Please_.”

“You don’t need me.” Taeil-hyung sounds mostly like growl, and Donghyuck can’t believe he’s still wearing his pants—still just out of reach, even though they’re—touching—Donghyuck is in his lap. “You _will_.”

“It’s unfair,” Donghyuck sobs, on the cusp and hating it. “I’ll be good. I’ll be good for you. I won’t be—fuck—mean.” Taeil-hyung has gotten the toy so large that thrusting is starting to be impossible, but that hasn’t changed the force of his movements, or the bone melting pleasure of his thrusts. He works the head of the cock right up and against Donghyuck’s prostate, drags the fake knot until Donghyuck can’t do more than just sob and take it, and through it all, _denies_. “Please,” Donghyuck says again, breathless and suddenly terrified of orgasm. “Please.” He lifts his head, panics because everything is blurry and fuzzy and more than just distorted by astigmatism. “Hyung—” His panic is like a live wire through the room and he feels it more than just tastes it. “I—”

Taeil-hyung lets go of the dildo and puts his hands on Donghyuck’s bare back, warm and soothing. “Shh,” he says. “Donghyuck, shh.”

Donghyuck stares, finds Taeil-hyung’s eyes through the mist of salt water, and stares, caught right at the precipice. He feels—he feels—“Taeil-hyung?”

“I’ve got you,” Taeil-hyung says, and Donghyuck slides over the edge, tumbles off the cliff, and floats. It’s definitely dry, that time. Probably. Maybe. Most likely. Donghyuck’s body has nothing more left to give—is spent—although if Taeil-hyung asked—if Taeil-hyung wrapped his hands around Donghyuck’s cock and _asked_ —Donghyuck thinks he’d have found a way to offer.

He’s in heat.

If there was ever a time for it to be possible.

But Chenle’s inflatable dildo does what it professed to do, locking inside Donghyuck for long enough for his skin to feel less twitchy, and his limbs less wobbly. He’s not—better. He knows there’s still hours more, but that bit of plastic has tricked his body into thinking it’s gotten what it wants—what it needs—and Taeil-hyung is warm, and comforting and safe.

“Lee Donghyuck.” Taeil-hyung’s voice is funny, but Donghyuck can’t be bothered to do more than hum into his hair.

“Hmm?”

“These are my favorite pants.”

Donghyuck cracks an eye long enough to look down, and note—not entirely dry after all, although maybe that’s mostly just _other things_. “Huh,” he says anyway, regarding his cock almost fondly. “Nice to see you're utterly whipped for him, too.”

If Taeil-hyung understands he doesn’t comment; if Taeil-hyung doesn’t understand, he doesn’t ask. “Haechan-ah.”

Donghyuck turns his attention from Taeil-hyung’s pants and Taeil-hyung’s stomach, and doesn’t even try to hide his grin. “Oh yeah,” he says, the animal in him incredibly pleased. He doesn’t want to get out of Taeil-hyung’s lap—probably because it would ruin the illusion of the knot in him being the other man’s—but he slides a hand down to rub the mess into Taeil-hyung’s skin anyway. “Sorry.”

Taeil-hyung just stares down at the mess, lips parted like he’ll spontaneously score high enough to smell how much their scenes are mingling. “You are not sorry.”

“I am not sorry,” Donghyuck agrees. “I’m in heat, though.”

Taeil-hyung’s eyes narrow. “That is not going to be your go to excuse.”

“That is absolutely going to be my go to excuse.”

Taeil-hyung growls, gives up on gentle, and shoves Donghyuck down onto the bed. The dildo in his ass drags as he does, and Donghyuck whines at the feel of it.

“Oh—”

“Haechan-ah.”

“Do you think I can do four because I’m in heat or because I’m young or both?” Donghyuck says, aware that he’s playing with fire but unable to help himself regardless.

To his credit, Taeil-hyung only bares his teeth at him and stares him down. “I don’t know,” he says finally. “All the other _omegas_ I’ve slept with—”

Donghyuck is going to fucking commit a murder. “Fine, I yield—fuck—oh.”

Taeil-hyung has gotten hold of the dildo again, pumped the pump teasingly and given the toy a very gentle tug that makes Donghyuck’s toes curl.

“Oh,” he says. “I still—five—”

“It’s the heat,” Taeil-hyung says, with an odd tone that makes guilt twist in Donghyuck’s stomach for the two second reprieve the heat lets him have, before it makes itself known.

“Good to know,” Donghyuck says faintly. “Want to try for lucky seven?”

It’s three more hours and two more faked knots before Donghyuck manages to feel relaxed enough to sleep, and even then, he refuses to let Taeil-hyung leave the room—or even the bed. He demands cuddles and refuses to let Taeil-hyung clean off; he concedes to Taeil removing the remainder of his soaked clothing, but then refuses to let Taeil-hyung go long enough to steal something of Johnny’s.

Taeil-hyung sighs and definitely puts Donghyuck into the wet spot on purpose, but he also cuddles him back. He pets through Donghyuck’s sweaty hair and tolerates what Donghyuck’s non-heat addled brain is horrified to realize might just be some sort of variant on nesting. Certainly he’s never been this particular about how he lies in a bed before, even when sharing with Mark or Jaehyun-hyung.

And—oh.

There’s his propriety, back from the war.

“Love you,” Donghyuck thinks he says, somewhere in the middle of the afterglow. Taeil-hyung’s turned the lights out and it’s nice, cuddling. Nice enough that Donghyuck could throw away all self-preservation and _say I love you_ , fuck. “Honestly. Thank you. Really. Even though I am in the wet spot.” That last bit is a front, meant to throw Taeil-hyung off the scent, but when Taeil-hyung laughs—when he picks Donghyuck up and deposits him on Johnny-hyung’s bed with a smirk so that he can change the sheets—Donghyuck tells himself he’s happy it worked. He’s only still weepy because his heat isn’t all the way over.

* * *

For one horrifying second, backstage at _Music Bank_ waiting for their turn to perform, Donghyuck thinks he has managed to ruin everything. Taeil-hyung spends most of his free time bothering Jungwoo-hyung, gently teasing their makeup-noonas, and ribbing Doyoung-hyung over his worry about high notes. He goes over some script for JCC with Johnny-hyung, exchanges a water bottle with Jaehyun-hyung, and would seem perfectly normal were it not for how he’s very clearly finding time for everyone but Donghyuck.

Not that Donghyuck makes it easy. He’s got his own things to do, listening to lectures from three staff and pointedly swallowing the high grade suppressants they’re making him take until the end of “Kick It” promotions (like “Punch” won’t be starting immediately after that). He hangs off Mark, then herds him over to a gleeful Yuta-hyung and lets Taeyong-hyung run off two manager-hyungs so that he can make sure everything is okay as well.

“You are fine, through, right?” says Taeyong, in a tone that is far too kind for how Donghyuck feels right now.

So he says, “I think we should all agree to just never speak of it again,” while giving his new bottle of suppressants a pointed shake. “Unless you want to start sharing with the class, in which case, have I got stories from my time rooming with Jaehyunnie-hyung for you.”

Taeyong just clears his throat and blushes. “No, I just mean—there are things we should talk about—”

Donghyuck gives the bottle another rattle, before shoving him off towards Jaehyun-hyung and making a beeline for literally _anywhere else_. Taeyong-hyung looked about two seconds from talking about _birth control_ or fucking… _sexually transmitted diseases_ , probably, and if this was what it was to be deflowered in NCT, Donghyuck would be okay with having this not really count. Nobody’s dick had gone anywhere near anyone’s asshole, first of all, so like, he thinks he could make a compelling argument.

“Love you too, Taeyongie-hyung, thank you!” Donghyuck says as he goes, spotting Taeil-hyung finally alone on a chair against the wall, and redirecting his course.

Taeil-hyung has to hear him coming, but he doesn’t look up at his phone, waiting for Donghyuck to make his next move without so much as an eyebrow raise.

Donghyuck climbs into his lap and tries not to think about how he’d done the same only hours before. “Hyung,” he says, once he’s finished arranging his elbows and knees among all of Taeil-hyung’s soft bits. “We’re good, right?”

Taeil-hyung groans and twists as necessary but doesn’t move away. After a moment, Donghyuck feels a hand settle around his back. “Hello to you too.”

“Hyung.” Donghyuck is aware he’s whining and aware last time he did that there were significantly less clothes involved, but he can’t stop. “Answer the question.” He twists so he can stare up at Taeil-hyung, feeling kind of like a lost dog.

Taeil-hyung stares right back, eyes beautiful and expansive. Finally, he sets aside his phone, the other hand joining it’s partner around Donghyuck’s waist. “Of course we’re good,” Taeil-hyung says. He shifts on the seat so that no one is at risk of falling off, and grins down at Donghyuck with utterly no pretense. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

“Oh.” Donghyuck swallows. “Good.” Donghyuck smiles, and snuggles even closer. Taeil-hyung lets him, and it only feels a little like something in Donghyuck is breaking apart. His chest aches a little—old wounds coming open that have no business bleeding everywhere—but with enough work, with enough practice, Donghyuck should be able to wrestle the feelings back down where he’d buried them. It’s painful, but Donghyuck has been doing that since basically 2016, anyway, so it’s not like it’s anything new.

**Author's Note:**

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